Today is my 42nd birthday and I'm feeling great!
I didn't post last week because our family went out of town last Friday to visit relatives for the weekend. When we returned, we had house guests, and then my hubby and I went out of town again two days ago and we are still gone. I have been doing some intense online training for my piano teaching, but I decided I should take a break and give a report on my health efforts.
As I said in my opening line, I'm feeling great. Have I lost weight? Maybe a tiny bit, but that's not what I'm excited about. These past couple of weeks have taught me that the number on the scale doesn't affect how I feel as much as my food choices affect how I feel. If I feel that I am in control of my food rather than my food controlling me, I feel an inner peace and contentment. Now, if the scale had gone up, I'm not sure I would have felt so content, but even with it not going down as much as I need it to to be on target for my "healthy wage," I'm just so thrilled that I have been able to navigate many of my trigger situations withou bingeing or bailing out on my efforts.
Travel and vacations have alway been a trigger for me to overeat and especially to eat the wrong foods. On our 5 to 6 hour drive to PA last weekend, I did have some moments when I came close to giving up. I ate before we left, I had carrots and apples to munch on, but it's just not the same when everyone around you is eating Cheetos and peanut m&m's. I didn't know those foods had a smell, but they do, and when you are a car for an extended period of time with them, you start to question the importance of your commitment NOT to eat that stuff. By the time we stopped for dinner, I was hanging on by a thread. My family wanted to eat at Steak & Shake. I knew from experience there weren't any satisfying choices for me there, not to mention that watching my family eat burgers, fries, and milkshakes was not going to help me at all. I chose to drive to Subway and eat by myself instead. As I did, I thought about the social complications of eating WFPB. It can be isolating in some ways, but I tried not to linger on that thought because it doesn't serve me. I tried to enjoy the peace and quiet of eating by myself (which after a long car ride with four boys was actually quite nice) and I kept reminding myself that the sacrifice was worth it.
Things got more challenging at my brother's house. Between me being a vegetarian who wasn't eating sugar, and my kids being picky, my sister-in-law didn't know what to cook and she felt bad. Maybe frustrated too? I had brought my own food (which was awkward in ways), and I told her to make whatever she normally made and my kids would eat the parts they liked, but it was just a bit uncomfortable and that is hard for me. I used to be the person you could count on to gobble up your made-with-love-home-cooked food and gush over how wonderful it was. That is how I like to be as a guest and it's hard to not be that person anymore. I just had to try to be a gracious guest in other ways, while rejecting her homemade cinnamon rolls and chicken pot pie! Once again, the social aspect of this lifestyle change is no small matter. It's something I have to come to terms with. I have to accept that I'm going to be different than the way I used to be, that it's okay, that it's worth it. I have to accept that vacation and travel is going to be different. It's not going to be about visiting the unique ice cream parlors, trying new restaurants, eating fun snacks, etc. It's different.
So once I navigated that trip, I had to navigate having guests at my home and trying to make meals that would work for everyone. Because our guests were sight-seeing, I really only had to do one big dinner. We had a baked potato bar, salad, and chill. There were rolls, toppings, and desserts that they could eat that I didn't, but there was still enough food for me to be satisfied.
Now I'm on a trip with hubby. We are staying in a condo and cooking most of our meals here and they are healthy. There is a small part of me that says, "that's no fun," but there is another part of me that is grateful to save money by cooking ourselves and grateful to only have to cook for two! We are keeping it pretty simple anyway. Last night we went out to dinner for my birthday and I gave myself permission ahead of time to overeat and have dessert for that one meal. Dessert once a week is built into my food plan, so I can eat it without the guilt and that is really nice. I enjoyed eating an abundance of food last night, but it was also a good reminder that although overeating feels pleasurable when you are doing it, it doesn't feel so great afterward when you are stuffed and lethargic. Good reminder! Having not felt that way for a couple of weeks, I really noticed the difference.
My focus the past two weeks has been to eat high-nutrition and enough calories at each meal to feel satisfied so I'm not fighting the urge to snack or eat the wrong foods. It is really working. I haven't struggled with cravings and I have been able to not eat after dinner and be okay. Reminding myself that's the urge to eat at night is a "conditioned response" that I can train away is also helping. That is something that was discussed in the link I posted last week. All in all, I feel really happy to be in control of my food choices and to be following my personal food plan.
That's all for now. Time to get back to my Simply Piano training.
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